"
"Of course you are," he replied; "but, possibly, only for yourself. I
mean, for instance, that you can't be sure you're right for Claire."
"No, no, that's just the same as saying there isn't any right or wrong
at all, and you know better. Yes, what I am certain about is duty; you
must do that before everything else. Peyton's duty is to Claire and
their child. It is as clear as this soup. Nothing else matters so much,
or at all. Why, Lee, the world is made up of people doing their duty;
what, I'd like to know, would become of it if they didn't? You don't
seem to realize it, but there are loads of obligations I get dreadfully
tired of, like the Social Service when it is my month to follow the
accounts, and visits to Annie Hazard who has a cancer of the stomach
and is dying, and thinking every day what to get you and the children
and the servants to eat. Suppose, some morning, I didn't stir, but just
rested in bed--what would happen? What did happen last winter when I
had pleurisy? Why, the whole house went to pieces, and, when you
weren't worrying about me, while I was getting well, you were the most
uncomfortable man imaginable. I don't want you to think I am
complaining, or that I don't love every minute and stick and stone of
my home and life; I do. But you seem to forget about me ... that's
because the house goes along so smoothly. It would be a good lesson if
you had to live with some other woman for a while.
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